Get Her Back (Demontech) (12 page)

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

      Haft aimed his demon spitter at the mass of screaming warriors beyond the line of Bloody Axes to his front and pressed the lever that told the demon to spit. There was a thunderous roar and the tube bucked on Haft’s shoulder. A brilliant flash and another roar marked where the demon’s spit struck. The nomad warrior who was hit directly was blasted into many pieces, his blood, bits of flesh and bone flew about, smacking into other charging warriors, several of whom were also injured by the explosion and fell, dead, dying, or wounded badly enough to be out of the battle. Screams of pain were added to the battle cries.

      Haft shifted his aim and his demon spat again, once more poking a hole in the mass of warriors racing out of the sun. And a third time and a fourth. Each time, the wounded added their screams to the cacophony of battle cries. Fewer warriors were now charging the Bloody Axes in front of Haft, but they still greatly outnumbered the thin line of defenders.

      To Haft’s rear, Tabib took quick aim with his small demon  spitter and began pressing.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
and four more times, re-aiming each time. One warrior stutter-stepped as though he’d run into something hard and immobile and collapsed. Another flipped backward, a third doubled over and tumbled, clutching his torn-open belly. Three more warriors fell, dead or severely wounded—only one spit had missed.

      The door at the bottom of the hand-held weapon popped open and the tiny demon inside it poked its head out and whined,
“Veed mee!”
Tabib almost dropped the weapon trying to fumble out a food pellet and one of the orbs he’d put in his wrap at the same time. He tucked the small demon spitter under his arm to free both hands.  As soon as he fed the tiny demon, he gripped the orb between  his hands and twisted its top, then threw it into the midst of the charging warriors.

      The orb was a Phoenix egg. It cracked open and fell apart the  instant it hit the ground, and a huge, fiery bird rose out of it, its wings unfurling and stretching. The Phoenix flapped its wings as soon as they were spread, and with every stroke it hit warriors with those fiery wings, setting them ablaze. Everything touched by the Phoenix burst into flame including, it seemed, the very ground itself. Men so touched were often incinerated before they even had time to scream. Others sounded like their screams were tearing their lungs out. Warriors who weren’t touched but were close enough to feel the scorching heat of the flaming bird, screamed and ran away from it. Slowly, ponderously, the bird rose into the air and flew away.

      Tabib pulled out a second Phoenix egg, cocked and threw it into a different part of the fast-closing mass of nomad warriors, and more nomad warriors were consumed in the Phoenix’s fires. But then the nomads were too close to the Bloody Axes in front of Tabib for him to dare using his third egg. He again fired his small demon spitter. But there were still far more attacking warriors than there were Bloody Axes in the thin line.

      A hundred warriors bore down on the Zobrans’ lance wall, with the points of their long spears leading the way.

      “Parry them!” Lieutenant Guma shouted at his men. He stood a third of the way to the right end of the line of Royal Lancers, his lance braced under his left arm, his sword ready in his right hand.

      “You heard the man,” Sergeant Prafost shouted, “parry their spears!” He stood a third of the way to the left end of the line of Royal Lancers.

      The center half of the line of nomad spearmen smashed into the line of Royal Lancers, its ends crashed into the Bloody Axes to either side of the Zobrans. The lancers were more lightly armed and armored than the nomad spearmen, their weapons and tactics were meant to be fought from horseback. But they were well trained and highly skilled—as to be expected of troops tasked with protecting royal personages. Most of them were able to deflect the spear points aimed at them, and then slide the points of their own lances along the spear shafts toward their attackers.

      Two spearmen raced straight at Oxa, their spear points aimed directly at the middle of his body. Locked as he was in the wall of Royal Lancers, he could move neither left nor right to dodge the spears. The spearman on his right was slightly closer than the one on his left. Oxa waited and waited, with the point of his lance pointed between the two screaming warriors as they closed on him. At the last second, he dipped his lance tip, swung it to the right and up and back to the left, looping it under the spear to push it to the left.

      The spear was heavier than he’d expected, but Oxa was as strong as the ox he was named after, and he pushed hard to lever the spear point up and away from its track to his body. It smacked the other spear on its way, deflecting it enough to make it pass between him and Nyten, who stood on his left. He stomped forward and lunged with his lance.

      The nomad warrior stumbled; he’d expected his spear to meet the resistance of ramming into a body. His face had a startled expression right before the tip of Oxa’s lance head pierced his eye and broke into his brain, killing him.

     Nyten, meanwhile, was staggered back by the near miss of the second spear that had been aimed at Oxa. That saved his life, as another spear intended for him missed. The warrior who had meant to skewer Nyten instead slammed into him and bowled him over.

      Now the Bogart, who had crouched by Tabib’s side all this time, finally moved. She bounded from the mage’s side and launched herself at the nomad who had just knocked Nyten from his feet and was raising his spear to impale the downed Zobran. The Bogart’s paws hit the warrior high on his chest, jarring him and making his downward strike miss its target. Snarling, she opened her jaws wide and chomped onto the warrior’s throat. With a violent shake of her head, she ripped through his jugular vein and windpipe. She leaped away as he dropped to his knees and tumbled over.

      Another nomad burst through the hole in the line where Nyten had stood, and charged screaming straight at Tabib, spear point aimed for the mage’s heart.

      Tabib smiled blissfully; his protection spell hadn’t had the chance to work against the cats that had attacked the platoon a few days earlier—this was its chance to work its magic.

      Tabib waited until the spear point was mere inches away from his breast before he moved. He gracefully sidestepped, and the sharp point missed him by the width of a hair. An instant later Tabib stepped back, allowing the arm of the warrior to slam against him. The Shade that protected the mage lashed out at the hostile touch—suddenly-visible claws tore through flesh and came away covered in blood. The nomad cried out, more in surprise than pain. He juddered to a stop and twisted about to lunge at Tabib. The mage again gracefully sidestepped the spear thrust, but not far enough to avoid contact with the warrior. Again, at the hostile touch, suddenly- visible claws slashed, causing blood to gush and spurt from his side and belly. The warrior stumbled to a stop, with a startled expression on his face. Tabib casually stepped up behind him and plunged a stiletto between his ribs just to the left of his spine, into his heart. The man bucked and tried to claw at the dagger in his back. Then he gurgled and fell straight forward onto his face, dead before he landed.

      “Yes,” Tabib murmured, “my spell protects me from more than the wind and grit.”

      The Bogart, having dispatched the warrior she fought, glanced back to make sure Tabib was safe. She saw him finishing off his assailant, jumped into the gap where Nyten had stood and, snarling above the clangor of clashing weapons and bellowing combatants, held the Royal Lancer’s place until he regained his feet and resumed his position. Then she moved back and waited for the next nomad to break through.

     At the same time, the Bloody Axes stood slowly swinging their axes pendulum-like, left to right and back as they watched  the nomad warriors charging at them. There was enough room from one Skraglander to the next for both of them to swing their axes in battle. They stood well balanced, with their feet apart, one slightly forward of the other, so they could instantly move in any direction.

      Vedelem grinned at the nomad warriors charging toward him. He didn’t look to the rear, so he didn’t know that these spearmen weren’t packed as close to each other as those who were attacking the Royal Lancers. All he knew was that he was going to break the spears coming to kill him—or die in the attempt.

      The first spear point barely wavered as it sped straight for Vedelem’s chest. But Vedelem pirouetted out of its way, and swung his mighty axe up, over, and down onto the spear’s shaft. The halfmoon blade clanked off of the shaft like it was tempered steel, and the axe vibrated in the Skraglander’s hands almost brutally enough to send it spinning out of his hands. But he held his grip, and twisted the axe so that its rebound went sideways instead of straight up, and the spike that backed the blade slammed through the boiled leather of the nomad’s cuirass. The warrior flipped backward, his legs  extended straight out before him, and was dead from a ruptured heart before his body thudded to the ground.

      Vedelem roared out in pain as the point of a spear wielded by  another nomad hit his side and gouged a deep furrow along his ribs. He barely had time to yank his axe out of the man he’d just killed  before he was bowled off his feet by the nomad who speared him.  He tumbled as he went down, and the sweep of his axe hit his antagonist in the ankle, nearly severing his foot. The nomad screamed and dropped his spear to clutch at his ankle. Vedelem swung his  axe at the man’s neck and put him out of his agony, with his head bouncing across the ground, away from his body.

      Groaning from the pain of his wound, Vedelem got back to his feet and held his axe ready to deal with another foe.

      Haft and Balta weren’t on the line, they were behind it looking for breakthroughs to plug. And the Bloody Axes were far enough apart that some of the nomads were able to make it through their line without being sliced by the blade of a swinging axe. Which meant that Haft and Balta were constantly on the move, hewing down nomad warriors.

     
“Ooz mee, ooz mee!”
the demon in Haft’s demon spitter squealed. “
Oo bounz’n mee doo mush! Goam brek’um mee owzz!”

      “I can’t stop,” Haft said, panting. “I can’t take the time to use you, there are too many of them getting through!” He punctuated that statement with a sidestep and chop at a spearman who’d come at him with murder in his eyes. The only murder the nomad met was his own death as Haft’s axe split his chest open.

      The demon abandoned its tube to clamber up to Haft’s shoulder, where it grasped his ear with one gnarly hand. “
Zheer, zheer!”
it piped, and pointed at a knot of spearmen massing for a charge at a section of line that was weakened with two Skraglanders down.

      “Back in your tube,” Haft ordered. He let his axe dangle by its wrist strap and raised the tube to his shoulder. As soon as he heard the demon’s door
snick!
closed, he aimed and pressed the lever. The demon spat with a crack of thunder. An instant later there was  an eruption in the middle of the knot of spearmen. They went  down, and only one or two staggered back to their feet to wander whimpering away, dazed and bleeding.

      Haft began turning in a circle, looking for more targets. A fearsome grin split his face.

      Alyline crouched behind the wall of Royal Lancers. The wall wasn’t as solid as it had been a few minutes earlier, and some of the soldiers were down. She hadn’t been able to get to any of their swords because the nomads who cut them down stood over them, fighting with the men to their sides. With a scream of frustration, she rushed at one of the spearmen standing over a lancer’s body and leaped on him, wrapping her left arm around his neck and clamping her legs around his middle. She slashed at his face with her dagger. The knife blade sliced through his left eye and cut off half of his nose. He bellowed in shock and pain and swung around, trying to dislodge his attacker.

      Alyline bit through his ear.

      He staggered and tripped over the lancer at his feet, falling on his face. Alyline jumped free of him and dropped to her knees to plunge her knife into his throat. He kicked and thrashed, grasping at his throat as he gurgled and his life gushed out. Satisfied that he was in his final throes, the Golden Girl reached across him to the sword belt of the lancer the warrior had been standing over and pulled out his sword. Before she could stand to use it, a nomad with a lance broken off in his chest collapsed on top of her, pinning her to the ground.